A Start in Life (tr. Katharine Prescott Wormeley)
by Honore de Balzac
Hypertext Meanings and Commentaries
from the Encyclopedia of the Self
by Mark Zimmerman

BY

HONORE DE BALZAC

Translated By
Katharine Prescott Wormeley

DEDICATION

To Laure.

Let the brilliant mind that gave me the subject of this Scene
have the honor of it.

Her brother,

De Balzac

A START IN LIFE

CHAPTER I

THAT WHICH WAS LACKING TO PIERROTIN'S HAPPINESS

Railroads, in a future not far distant, must force certain industries
to disappear forever, and modify several others, more especially those
relating to the different modes of transportation in use around Paris.
Therefore the persons and things which are the elements of this Scene
will soon give to it the character of an archaeological work. Our
nephews ought to be enchanted to learn the social material of an epoch
which they will call the "olden time." The picturesque "coucous" which
stood on the Place de la Concorde, encumbering the Cours-la-Reine,--
coucous which had flourished for a century, and were still numerous in
1830, scarcely exist in 1842, unless on the occasion of some
attractive suburban solemnity, like that of the Grandes Eaux of
Versailles. In 1820, the various celebrated places called the
"Environs of Paris" did not all possess a regular stage-coach service.

Nevertheless, the Touchards, father and son, had acquired a monopoly
of travel and transportation to all the populous towns within a
radius of forty-five miles; and their enterprise constituted a fine
establishment in the rue du Faubourg-Saint-Denis. In spite of their
long-standing rights, in spite, too, of their efforts, their capital,
and all the advantages of a powerful centralization, the Touchard
coaches ("messageries") found terrible competition in the coucous for
all points with a circumference of fifteen or twenty miles. The
passion of the Parisian for the country is such that local enterprise
could successfully compete with the Lesser Stage company,--Petites
Messageries, the name given to the Touchard enterprise to distinguish
it from that of the Grandes Messageries of the rue Montmartre. At the
time of which we write, the Touchard success was stimulating
speculators. For every small locality in the neighborhood of Paris
there sprang up schemes of beautiful, rapid, and commodious vehicles,
departing and arriving in Paris at fixed hours, which produced,
naturally, a fierce competition. Beaten on the long distances of
twelve to eighteen miles, the coucou came down to shorter trips, and
so lived on for several years. At last, however, it succumbed to
omnibuses, which demonstrated the possibility of carrying eighteen
persons in a vehicle drawn by two horses. To-day the coucous--if by
chance any of those birds of ponderous flight still linger in the
second-hand carriage-shops--might be made, as to its structure and
arrangement, the subject of learned researches comparable to those of
Cuvier on the animals discovered in the chalk pits of Montmartre.

These petty enterprises, which had struggled since 1822 against the
Touchards, usually found a strong foothold in the good-will and
sympathy of the inhabitants of the districts which they served. The
person undertaking the business as proprietor and conductor was nearly
always an inn-keeper along the route, to whom the beings, things, and
interests with which he had to do were all familiar. He could execute
commissions intelligently; he never asked as much for his little
stages, and therefore obtained more custom than the Touchard coaches.
He managed to elude the necessity of a custom-house permit. If need
were, he was willing to infringe the law as to the number of
passengers he might carry. In short, he possessed the affection of the
masses; and thus it happened that whenever a rival came upon the same
route, if his days for running were not the same as those of the
coucou, travellers would put off their journey to make it with their
long-tried coachman, although his vehicle and his horses might be in a
far from reassuring condition.

One of the lines which the Touchards, father and son, endeavored to
monopolize, and the one most stoutly disputed (as indeed it still is),
is that of Paris to Beaumont-sur-Oise,--a line extremely profitable,
for three rival enterprises worked it in 1822. In vain the Touchards
lowered their price; in vain they constructed better coaches and
started oftener. Competition still continued, so productive is a line
on which are little towns like Saint-Denis and Saint-Brice, and
villages like Pierrefitte, Groslay, Ecouen, Poncelles, Moisselles,
Monsoult, Maffliers, Franconville, Presles, Nointel, Nerville, etc.
The Touchard coaches finally extended their route to Chambly; but
competition followed. To-day the Toulouse, a rival enterprise, goes as
far as Beauvais.

Along this route, which is that toward England, there lies a road
which turns off at a place well-named, in view of its topography, The
Cave, and leads through a most delightful valley in the basin of the
Oise to the little town of Isle-Adam, doubly celebrated as the cradle
of the family, now extinct, of Isle-Adam, and also as the former
residence of the Bourbon-Contis. Isle-Adam is a little town flanked by
two large villages, Nogent and Parmain, both remarkable for splendid
quarries, which have furnished material for many of the finest
buildings in modern Paris and in foreign lands,--for the base and
capital of the columns of the Brussels theatre are of Nogent stone.
Though remarkable for its beautiful sites, for the famous chateaux
which princes, monks, and designers have built, such as Cassan, Stors,
Le Val, Nointel, Persan, etc., this region had escaped competition in
1822, and was reached by two coaches only, working more or less in
harmony.

This exception to the rule of rivalry was founded on reasons that are
easy to understand. From the Cave, the point on the route to England
where a paved road (due to the luxury of the Princes of Conti) turned
off to Isle-Adam, the distance is six miles. No speculating enterprise
would make such a detour, for Isle-Adam was the terminus of the road,
which did not go beyond it. Of late years, another road has been made
between the valley of Montmorency and the valley of the Oise; but in
1822 the only road which led to Isle-Adam was the paved highway of the
Princes of Conti. Pierrotin and his colleague reigned, therefore, from
Paris to Isle-Adam, beloved by every one along the way. Pierrotin's
vehicle, together with that of his comrade, and Pierrotin himself,
were so well known that even the inhabitants on the main road as far
as the Cave were in the habit of using them; for there was always
better chance of a seat to be had than in the Beaumont coaches, which
were almost always full. Pierrotin and his competitor were on the best
of terms. When the former started from Isle-Adam, the latter was
returning from Paris, and vice versa.

It is unnecessary to speak of the rival. Pierrotin possessed the
sympathies of his region; besides, he is the only one of the two who
appears in this veracious narrative. Let it suffice you to know that
the two coach proprietors lived under a good understanding, rivalled
each other loyally, and obtained customers by honorable proceedings.
In Paris they used, for economy's sake, the same yard, hotel, and
stable, the same coach-house, office, and clerk. This detail is alone
sufficient to show that Pierrotin and his competitor were, as the
popular saying is, "good dough." The hotel at which they put up in
Paris, at the corner of the rue d'Enghien, is still there, and is
called the "Lion d'Argent." The proprietor of the establishment, which
from time immemorial had lodged coachmen and coaches, drove himself
for the great company of Daumartin, which was so firmly established
that its neighbors, the Touchards, whose place of business was
directly opposite, never dreamed of starting a rival coach on the
Daumartin line.

Though the departures for Isle-Adam professed to take place at a fixed
hour, Pierrotin and his co-rival practised an indulgence in that
respect which won for them the grateful affection of the country-
people, and also violent remonstrances on the part of strangers
accustomed to the regularity of the great lines of public conveyances.
But the two conductors of these vehicles, which were half diligence,
half coucou, were invariably defended by their regular customers. The
afternoon departure at four o'clock usually lagged on till half-past,
while that of the morning, fixed for eight o'clock, was seldom known
to take place before nine. In this respect, however, the system was
elastic. In summer, that golden period for the coaching business, the
rule of departure, rigorous toward strangers, was often relaxed for
country customers. This method not infrequently enabled Pierrotin to
pocket two fares for one place, if a countryman came early and wanted
a seat already booked and paid for by some "bird of passage" who was,
unluckily for himself, a little late. Such elasticity will certainly
not commend itself to purists in morality; but Pierrotin and his
colleague justified it on the varied grounds of "hard times," of their
losses during the winter months, of the necessity of soon getting
better coaches, and of the duty of keeping exactly to the rules
written on the tariff, copies of which were, however, never shown,
unless some chance traveller was obstinate enough to demand it.

Pierrotin, a man about forty years of age, was already the father of a
family. Released from the cavalry on the great disbandment of 1815,
the worthy fellow had succeeded his father, who for many years had
driven a coucou of capricious flight between Paris and Isle-Adam.
Having married the daughter of a small inn-keeper, he enlarged his
business, made it a regular service, and became noted for his
intelligence and a certain military precision. Active and decided in
his ways, Pierrotin (the name seems to have been a sobriquet)
contrived to give, by the vivacity of his countenance, an expression
of sly shrewdness to his ruddy and weather-stained visage which
suggested wit. He was not without that facility of speech which is
acquired chiefly through "seeing life" and other countries. His voice,
by dint of talking to his horses and shouting "Gare!" was rough; but
he managed to tone it down with the bourgeois. His clothing, like that
of all coachmen of the second class, consisted of stout boots, heavy
with nails, made at Isle-Adam, trousers of bottle-green velveteen,
waistcoat of the same, over which he wore, while exercising his
functions, a blue blouse, ornamented on the collar, shoulder-straps
and cuffs, with many-colored embroidery. A cap with a visor covered
his head. His military career had left in Pierrotin's manners and
customs a great respect for all social superiority, and a habit of
obedience to persons of the upper classes; and though he never
willingly mingled with the lesser bourgeoisie, he always respected
women in whatever station of life they belonged. Nevertheless, by dint
of "trundling the world,"--one of his own expressions,--he had come to
look upon those he conveyed as so many walking parcels, who required
less care than the inanimate ones,--the essential object of a coaching
business.

Warned by the general movement which, since the Peace, was
revolutionizing his calling, Pierrotin would not allow himself to be
outdone by the progress of new lights. Since the beginning of the
summer season he had talked much of a certain large coach, ordered
from Farry, Breilmann, and Company, the best makers of diligences,--a
purchase necessitated by an increasing influx of travellers.
Pierrotin's present establishment consisted of two vehicles. One,
which served in winter, and the only one he reported to the tax-
gatherer, was the coucou which he inherited from his father. The
rounded flanks of this vehicle allowed him to put six travellers on
two seats, of metallic hardness in spite of the yellow Utrecht velvet
with which they were covered. These seats were separated by a wooden
bar inserted in the sides of the carriage at the height of the
travellers' shoulders, which could be placed or removed at will. This
bar, specially covered with velvet (Pierrotin called it "a back"), was
the despair of the passengers, from the great difficulty they found in
placing and removing it. If the "back" was difficult and even painful
to handle, that was nothing to the suffering caused to the omoplates
when the bar was in place. But when it was left to lie loose across
the coach, it made both ingress and egress extremely perilous,
especially to women.

Though each seat of this vehicle, with rounded sides like those of a
pregnant woman, could rightfully carry only three passengers, it was
not uncommon to see eight persons on the two seats jammed together
like herrings in a barrel. Pierrotin declared that the travellers were
far more comfortable in a solid, immovable mass; whereas when only
three were on a seat they banged each other perpetually, and ran much
risk of injuring their hats against the roof by the violent jolting of
the roads. In front of the vehicle was a wooden bench where Pierrotin
sat, on which three travellers could perch; when there, they went, as
everybody knows, by the name of "rabbits." On certain trips Pierrotin
placed four rabbits on the bench, and sat himself at the side, on a
sort of box placed below the body of the coach as a foot-rest for the
rabbits, which was always full of straw, or of packages that feared no
damage. The body of this particular coucou was painted yellow,
embellished along the top with a band of barber's blue, on which could
be read, on the sides, in silvery white letters, "Isle-Adam, Paris,"
and across the back, "Line to Isle-Adam."

Our descendants will be mightily mistaken if they fancy that thirteen
persons including Pierrotin were all that this vehicle could carry. On
great occasions it could take three more in a square compartment
covered with an awning, where the trunks, cases, and packages were
piled; but the prudent Pierrotin only allowed his regular customers to
sit there, and even they were not allowed to get in until at some
distance beyond the "barriere." The occupants of the "hen-roost" (the
name given by conductors to this section of their vehicles) were made
to get down outside of every village or town where there was a post of
gendarmerie; the overloading forbidden by law, "for the safety of
passengers," being too obvious to allow the gendarme on duty--always a
friend to Pierrotin--to avoid the necessity of reporting this flagrant
violation of the ordinances. Thus on certain Saturday nights and
Monday mornings, Pierrotin's coucou "trundled" fifteen travellers; but
on such occasions, in order to drag it along, he gave his stout old
horse, called Rougeot, a mate in the person of a little beast no
bigger than a pony, about whose merits he had much to say. This little
horse was a mare named Bichette; she ate little, she was spirited, she
was indefatigable, she was worth her weight in gold.

"My wife wouldn't give her for that fat lazybones of a Rougeot!" cried
Pierrotin, when some traveller would joke him about his epitome of a
horse.

The difference between this vehicle and the other consisted chiefly in
the fact that the other was on four wheels. This coach, of comical
construction, called the "four-wheel-coach," held seventeen
travellers, though it was bound not to carry more than fourteen. It
rumbled so noisily that the inhabitants of Isle-Adam frequently said,
"Here comes Pierrotin!" when he was scarcely out of the forest which
crowns the slope of the valley. It was divided into two lobes, so to
speak: one, called the "interior," contained six passengers on two
seats; the other, a sort of cabriolet constructed in front, was called
the "coupe." This coupe was closed in with very inconvenient and
fantastic glass sashes, a description of which would take too much
space to allow of its being given here. The four-wheeled coach was
surmounted by a hooded "imperial," into which Pierrotin managed to
poke six passengers; this space was inclosed by leather curtains.
Pierrotin himself sat on an almost invisible seat perched just below
the sashes of the coupe.

The master of the establishment paid the tax which was levied upon all
public conveyances on his coucou only, which was rated to carry six
persons; and he took out a special permit each time that he drove the
four-wheeler. This may seem extraordinary in these days, but when the
tax on vehicles was first imposed, it was done very timidly, and such
deceptions were easily practised by the coach proprietors, always
pleased to "faire la queue" (cheat of their dues) the government
officials, to use the argot of their vocabulary. Gradually the greedy
Treasury became severe; it forced all public conveyances not to roll
unless they carried two certificates,--one showing that they had been
weighed, the other that their taxes were duly paid. All things have
their salad days, even the Treasury; and in 1822 those days still
lasted. Often in summer, the "four-wheel-coach," and the coucou
journeyed together, carrying between them thirty-two passengers,
though Pierrotin was only paying a tax on six. On these specially
lucky days the convoy started from the faubourg Saint-Denis at half-
past four o'clock in the afternoon, and arrived gallantly at Isle-Adam
by ten at night. Proud of this service, which necessitated the hire of
an extra horse, Pierrotin was wont to say:--

"We went at a fine pace!"

But in order to do the twenty-seven miles in five hours with his
caravan, he was forced to omit certain stoppages along the road,--at
Saint-Brice, Moisselles, and La Cave.

The hotel du Lion d'Argent occupies a piece of land which is very deep
for its width. Though its frontage has only three or four windows on
the faubourg Saint-Denis, the building extends back through a long
court-yard, at the end of which are the stables, forming a large house
standing close against the division wall of the adjoining property.
The entrance is through a sort of passage-way beneath the floor of the
second story, in which two or three coaches had room to stand. In 1822
the offices of all the lines of coaches which started from the Lion
d'Argent were kept by the wife of the inn-keeper, who had as many
books as there were lines. She received the fares, booked the
passengers, and stowed away, good-naturedly, in her vast kitchen the
various packages and parcels to be transported. Travellers were
satisfied with this easy-going, patriarchal system. If they arrived
too soon, they seated themselves beneath the hood of the huge kitchen
chimney, or stood within the passage-way, or crossed to the Cafe de
l'Echiquier, which forms the corner of the street so named.

In the early days of the autumn of 1822, on a Saturday morning,
Pierrotin was standing, with his hands thrust into his pockets through
the apertures of his blouse, beneath the porte-cochere of the Lion
d'Argent, whence he could see, diagonally, the kitchen of the inn, and
through the long court-yard to the stables, which were defined in
black at the end of it. Daumartin's diligence had just started,
plunging heavily after those of the Touchards. It was past eight
o'clock. Under the enormous porch or passage, above which could be
read on a long sign, "Hotel du Lion d'Argent," stood the stablemen and
porters of the coaching-lines watching the lively start of the
vehicles which deceives so many travellers, making them believe that
the horses will be kept to that vigorous gait.

"Shall I harness up, master?" asked Pierrotin's hostler, when there
was nothing more to be seen along the road.

"It is a quarter-past eight, and I don't see any travellers," replied
Pierrotin. "Where have they poked themselves? Yes, harness up all the
same. And there are no parcels either! Twenty good Gods! a fine day
like this, and I've only four booked! A pretty state of things for a
Saturday! It is always the same when you want money! A dog's life, and
a dog's business!"

"If you had more, where would you put them? There's nothing left but
the cabriolet," said the hostler, intending to soothe Pierrotin.

"You forget the new coach!" cried Pierrotin.

"Have you really got it?" asked the man, laughing, and showing a set
of teeth as white and broad as almonds.

"You old good-for-nothing! It starts to-morrow, I tell you; and I want
at least eighteen passengers for it."

"Ha, ha! a fine affair; it'll warm up the road," said the hostler.

"A coach like that which runs to Beaumont, hey? Flaming! painted red
and gold to make Touchard burst with envy! It takes three horses! I
have bought a mate for Rougeot, and Bichette will go finely in
unicorn. Come, harness up!" added Pierrotin, glancing out towards the
street, and stuffing the tobacco into his clay pipe. "I see a lady and
lad over there with packages under their arms; they are coming to the
Lion d'Argent, for they've turned a deaf ear to the coucous. Tiens,
tiens! seems to me I know that lady for an old customer."

"You've often started empty, and arrived full," said his porter, still
by way of consolation.

"But no parcels! Twenty good Gods! What a fate!"

And Pierrotin sat down on one of the huge stone posts which protected
the walls of the building from the wheels of the coaches; but he did
so with an anxious, reflective air that was not habitual with him.

This conversation, apparently insignificant, had stirred up cruel
anxieties which were slumbering in his breast. What could there be to
trouble the heart of Pierrotin in a fine new coach? To shine upon "the
road," to rival the Touchards, to magnify his own line, to carry
passengers who would compliment him on the conveniences due to the
progress of coach-building, instead of having to listen to perpetual
complaints of his "sabots" (tires of enormous width),--such was
Pierrotin's laudable ambition; but, carried away with the desire to
outstrip his comrade on the line, hoping that the latter might some
day retire and leave to him alone the transportation to Isle-Adam, he
had gone too far. The coach was indeed ordered from Barry, Breilmann,
and Company, coach-builders, who had just substituted square English
springs for those called "swan-necks," and other old-fashioned French
contrivances. But these hard and distrustful manufacturers would only
deliver over the diligence in return for coin. Not particularly
pleased to build a vehicle which would be difficult to sell if it
remained upon their hands, these long-headed dealers declined to
undertake it at all until Pierrotin had made a preliminary payment of
two thousand francs. To satisfy this precautionary demand, Pierrotin
had exhausted all his resources and all his credit. His wife, his
father-in-law, and his friends had bled. This superb diligence he had
been to see the evening before at the painter's; all it needed now was
to be set a-rolling, but to make it roll, payment in full must, alas!
be made.

Now, a thousand francs were lacking to Pierrotin, and where to get
them he did not know. He was in debt to the master of the Lion
d'Argent; he was in danger of his losing his two thousand francs
already paid to the coach-builder, not counting five hundred for the
mate to Rougeot, and three hundred for new harnesses, on which he had
a three-months' credit. Driven by the fury of despair and the madness
of vanity, he had just openly declared that the new coach was to start
on the morrow. By offering fifteen hundred francs, instead of the two
thousand five hundred still due, he was in hopes that the softened
carriage-builders would give him his coach. But after a few moments'
meditation, his feelings led him to cry out aloud:--

"No! they're dogs! harpies! Suppose I appeal to Monsieur Moreau, the
steward at Presles? he is such a kind man," thought Pierrotin, struck
with a new idea. "Perhaps he would take my note for six months."

At this moment a footman in livery, carrying a leather portmanteau and
coming from the Touchard establishment, where he had gone too late to
secure places as far as Chambly, came up and said:--

"Are you Pierrotin?"

"Say on," replied Pierrotin.

"If you would wait a quarter of an hour, you could take my master. If
not, I'll carry back the portmanteau and try to find some other
conveyance."

"I'll wait two, three quarters, and throw a little in besides, my
lad," said Pierrotin, eyeing the pretty leather trunk, well buckled,
and bearing a brass plate with a coat of arms.

"Very good; then take this," said the valet, ridding his shoulder of
the trunk, which Pierrotin lifted, weighed, and examined.

"Here," he said to his porter, "wrap it up carefully in soft hay and
put it in the boot. There's no name upon it," he added.

"Monseigneur's arms are there," replied the valet.

"Monseigneur! Come and take a glass," said Pierrotin, nodding toward
the Cafe de l'Echiquier, whither he conducted the valet. "Waiter, two
absinthes!" he said, as he entered. "Who is your master? and where is
he going? I have never seen you before," said Pierrotin to the valet
as they touched glasses.

"There's a good reason for that," said the footman. "My master only
goes into your parts about once a year, and then in his own carriage.
He prefers the valley d'Orge, where he has the most beautiful park in
the neighborhood of Paris, a perfect Versailles, a family estate of
which he bears the name. Don't you know Monsieur Moreau?"

"The steward of Presles?"

"Yes. Monsieur le Comte is going down to spend a couple of days with
him."

"Ha! then I'm to carry Monsieur le Comte de Serizy!" cried the coach-
proprietor.

"Yes, my land, neither more nor less. But listen! here's a special
order. If you have any of the country neighbors in your coach you are
not to call him Monsieur le comte; he wants to travel 'en cognito,'
and told me to be sure to say he would pay a handsome pourboire if he
was not recognized."

"So! Has this secret journey anything to do with the affair which Pere
Leger, the farmer at the Moulineaux, came to Paris the other day to
settle?"

"I don't know," replied the valet, "but the fat's in the fire. Last
night I was sent to the stable to order the Daumont carriage to be
ready to go to Presles at seven this morning. But when seven o'clock
came, Monsieur le comte countermanded it. Augustin, his valet de
chambre, attributes the change to the visit of a lady who called last
night, and again this morning,--he thought she came from the country."

"Could she have told him anything against Monsieur Moreau?--the best
of men, the most honest of men, a king of men, hey! He might have made
a deal more than he has out of his position, if he'd chosen; I can
tell you that."

"Then he was foolish," answered the valet, sententiously.

"Is Monsieur le Serizy going to live at Presles at last?" asked
Pierrotin; "for you know they have just repaired and refurnished the
chateau. Do you think it is true he has already spent two hundred
thousand francs upon it?"

"If you or I had half what he has spent upon it, you and I would be
rich bourgeois. If Madame la comtesse goes there--ha! I tell you what!
no more ease and comfort for the Moreaus," said the valet, with an air
of mystery.

"He's a worthy man, Monsieur Moreau," remarked Pierrotin, thinking of
the thousand francs he wanted to get from the steward. "He is a man
who makes others work, but he doesn't cheapen what they do; and he
gets all he can out of the land--for his master. Honest man! He often
comes to Paris and gives me a good fee: he has lots of errands for me
to do in Paris; sometimes three or four packages a day,--either from
monsieur or madame. My bill for cartage alone comes to fifty francs a
month, more or less. If madame does set up to be somebody, she's fond
of her children; and it is I who fetch them from school and take them
back; and each time she gives me five francs,--a real great lady
couldn't do better than that. And every time I have any one in the
coach belonging to them or going to see them, I'm allowed to drive up
to the chateau,--that's all right, isn't it?"

"They say Monsieur Moreau wasn't worth three thousand francs when
Monsieur le comte made him steward of Presles," said the valet.

"Well, since 1806, there's seventeen years, and the man ought to have
made something at any rate."

"True," said the valet, nodding. "Anyway, masters are very annoying;
and I hope, for Moreau's sake, that he has made butter for his bread."

"I have often been to your house in the rue de la Chaussee d'Antin to
carry baskets of game," said Pierrotin, "but I've never had the
advantage, so far of seeing either monsieur or madame."

"Monsieur le comte is a good man," said the footman, confidentially.
"But if he insists on your helping to keep up his cognito there's
something in the wind. At any rate, so we think at the house; or else,
why should he countermand the Daumont,--why travel in a coucou? A peer
of France might afford to hire a cabriolet to himself, one would
think."

"A cabriolet would cost him forty francs to go there and back; for let
me tell you, if you don't know it, that road was only made for
squirrels,--up-hill and down, down-hill and up!" said Pierrotin. "Peer
of France or bourgeois, they are all looking after the main chance,
and saving their money. If this journey concerns Monsieur Moreau,
faith, I'd be sorry any harm should come to him! Twenty good Gods!
hadn't I better find some way of warning him?--for he's a truly good
man, a kind man, a king of men, hey!"

"Pooh! Monsieur le comte thinks everything of Monsieur Moreau,"
replied the valet. "But let me give you a bit of good advice. Every
man for himself in this world. We have enough to do to take care of
ourselves. Do what Monsieur le comte asks you to do, and all the more
because there's no trifling with him. Besides, to tell the truth, the
count is generous. If you oblige him so far," said the valet, pointing
half-way down his little finger, "he'll send you on as far as that,"
stretching out his arm to its full length.

This wise reflection, and the action that enforced it, had the effect,
coming from a man who stood as high as second valet to the Comte de
Serizy, of cooling the ardor of Pierrotin for the steward of Presles.

"Well, adieu, Monsieur Pierrotin," said the valet.

A glance rapidly cast on the life of the Comte de Serizy, and on that
of his steward, is here necessary in order to fully understand the
little drama now about to take place in Pierrotin's vehicle.

CHAPTER II

THE STEWARD IN DANGER

Monsieur Huguet de Serisy descends in a direct line from the famous
president Huguet, ennobled under Francois I.

This family bears: party per pale or and sable, an orle counterchanged
and two lozenges counterchanged, with: "i, semper melius eris,"--a
motto which, together with the two distaffs taken as supporters,
proves the modesty of the burgher families in the days when the Orders
held their allotted places in the State; and the naivete of our
ancient customs by the pun on "eris," which word, combined with the
"i" at the beginning and the final "s" in "melius," forms the name
(Serisy) of the estate from which the family take their title.

The father of the present count was president of a parliament before
the Revolution. He himself a councillor of State at the Grand Council
of 1787, when he was only twenty-two years of age, was even then
distinguished for his admirable memoranda on delicate diplomatic
matters. He did not emigrate during the Revolution, and spent that
period on his estate of Serizy near Arpajon, where the respect in
which his father was held protected him from all danger. After
spending several years in taking care of the old president, who died
in 1794, he was elected about that time to the Council of the Five
Hundred, and accepted those legislative functions to divert his mind
from his grief. After the 18th Brumaire, Monsieur de Serizy became,
like so many other of the old parliamentary families, an object of the
First Consul's blandishment. He was appointed to the Council of State,
and received one of the most disorganized departments of the
government to reconstruct. This scion of an old historical family
proved to be a very active wheel in the grand and magnificent
organization which we owe to Napoleon.

The councillor of State was soon called from his particular
administration to a ministry. Created count and senator by the
Emperor, he was made proconsul to two kingdoms in succession. In 1806,
when forty years of age, he married the sister of the ci-devant
Marquis de Ronquerolles, the widow at twenty of Gaubert, one of the
most illustrious of the Republican generals, who left her his whole
property. This marriage, a suitable one in point of rank, doubled the
already considerable fortune of the Comte de Serizy, who became
through his wife the brother-in-law of the ci-devant Marquis de
Rouvre, made count and chamberlain by the Emperor.

In 1814, weary with constant toil, the Comte de Serizy, whose
shattered health required rest, resigned all his posts, left the
department at the head of which the Emperor had placed him, and came
to Paris, where Napoleon was compelled by the evidence of his eyes to
admit that the count's illness was a valid excuse, though at first
that UNFATIGUABLE master, who gave no heed to the fatigue of others,
was disposed to consider Monsieur de Serizy's action as a defection.
Though the senator was never in disgrace, he was supposed to have
reason to complain of Napoleon. Consequently, when the Bourbons
returned, Louis XVIII., whom Monsieur de Serizy held to be his
legitimate sovereign, treated the senator, now a peer of France, with
the utmost confidence, placed him in charge of his private affairs,
and appointed him one of his cabinet ministers. On the 20th of March,
Monsieur de Serizy did not go to Ghent. He informed Napoleon that he
remained faithful to the house of Bourbon; would not accept his
peerage during the Hundred Days, and passed that period on his estate
at Serizy.

After the second fall of the Emperor, he became once more a privy-
councillor, was appointed vice-president of the Council of State, and
liquidator, on behalf of France, of claims and indemnities demanded by
foreign powers. Without personal assumption, without ambition even, he
possessed great influence in public affairs. Nothing of importance was
done without consulting him; but he never went to court, and was
seldom seen in his own salons. This noble life, devoting itself from
its very beginning to work, had ended by becoming a life of incessant
toil. The count rose at all seasons by four o'clock in the morning,
and worked till mid-day, attended to his functions as peer of France
and vice-president of the Council of State in the afternoons, and went
to bed at nine o'clock. In recognition of such labor, the King had
made him a knight of his various Orders. Monsieur de Serizy had long
worn the grand cross of the Legion of honor; he also had the orders of
the Golden Fleece, of Saint-Andrew of Russia, that of the Prussian
Eagle, and nearly all the lesser Orders of the courts of Europe. No
man was less obvious, or more useful in the political world than he.
It is easy to understand that the world's honor, the fuss and feathers
of public favor, the glories of success were indifferent to a man of
this stamp; but no one, unless a priest, ever comes to life of this
kind without some serious underlying reason. His conduct had its
cause, and a cruel one.

In love with his wife before he married her, this passion had lasted
through all the secret unhappiness of his marriage with a widow,--a
woman mistress of herself before as well as after her second marriage,
and who used her liberty all the more freely because her husband
treated her with the indulgence of a mother for a spoilt child. His
constant toil served him as shield and buckler against pangs of heart
which he silenced with the care that diplomatists give to the keeping
of secrets. He knew, moreover, how ridiculous was jealousy in the eyes
of a society that would never have believed in the conjugal passion of
an old statesman. How happened it that from the earliest days of his
marriage his wife so fascinated him? Why did he suffer without
resistance? How was it that he dared not resist? Why did he let the
years go by and still hope on? By what means did this young and pretty
and clever woman hold him in bondage?

The answer to all these questions would require a long history, which
would injure our present tale. Let us only remark here that the
constant toil and grief of the count had unfortunately contributed not
a little to deprive him of personal advantages very necessary to a man
who attempts to struggle against dangerous comparisons. In fact, the
most cruel of the count's secret sorrows was that of causing
repugnance to his wife by a malady of the skin resulting solely from
excessive labor. Kind, and always considerate of the countess, he
allowed her to be mistress of herself and her home. She received all
Paris; she went into the country; she returned from it precisely as
though she were still a widow. He took care of her fortune and
supplied her luxury as a steward might have done. The countess had the
utmost respect for her husband. She even admired his turn of mind; she
knew how to make him happy by approbation; she could do what she
pleased with him by simply going to his study and talking for an hour
with him. Like the great seigneurs of the olden time, the count
protected his wife so loyally that a single word of disrespect said of
her would have been to him an unpardonable injury. The world admired
him for this; and Madame de Serizy owed much to it. Any other woman,
even though she came of a family as distinguished as the Ronquerolles,
might have found herself degraded in public opinion. The countess was
ungrateful, but she mingled a charm with her ingratitude. From time to
time she shed a balm upon the wounds of her husband's heart.

Let us now explain the meaning of this sudden journey, and the
incognito maintained by a minister of State.

A rich farmer of Beaumont-sur-Oise, named Leger, leased and cultivated
a farm, the fields of which projected into and greatly injured the
magnificent estate of the Comte de Serizy, called Presles. This farm
belonged to a burgher of Beaumont-sur-Oise, named Margueron. The lease
made to Leger in 1799, at a time when the great advance of agriculture
was not foreseen, was about to expire, and the owner of the farm
refused all offers from Leger to renew the lease. For some time past,
Monsieur de Serizy, wishing to rid himself of the annoyances and petty
disputes caused by the inclosure of these fields within his land, had
desired to buy the farm, having heard that Monsieur Margueron's chief
ambition was to have his only son, then a mere tax-gatherer, made
special collector of finances at Beaumont. The farmer, who knew he
could sell the fields piecemeal to the count at a high price, was
ready to pay Margueron even more than he expected from the count.

Thus matters stood when, two days earlier than that of which we write,
Monsieur de Serizy, anxious to end the matter, sent for his notary,
Alexandre Crottat, and his lawyer, Derville, to examine into all the
circumstances of the affair. Though Derville and Crottat threw some
doubt on the zeal of the count's steward (a disturbing letter from
whom had led to the consultation), Monsieur de Serizy defended Moreau,
who, he said, had served him faithfully for seventeen years.

"Very well!" said Derville, "then I advise your Excellency to go to
Presles yourself, and invite this Margueron to dinner. Crottat will
send his head-clerk with a deed of sale drawn up, leaving only the
necessary lines for description of property and titles in blank. Your
Excellency should take with you part of the purchase money in a check
on the Bank of France, not forgetting the appointment of the son to
the collectorship. If you don't settle the thing at once that farm
will slip through your fingers. You don't know, Monsieur le comte, the
trickery of these peasants. Peasants against diplomat, and the
diplomat succumbs."

Crottat agreed in this advice, which the count, if we may judge by the
valet's statements to Pierrotin, had adopted. The preceding evening he
had sent Moreau a line by the diligence to Beaumont, telling him to
invite Margueron to dinner in order that they might then and there
close the purchase of the farm of Moulineaux.

Before this matter came up, the count had already ordered the chateau
of Presles to be restored and refurnished, and for the last year,
Grindot, an architect then in fashion, was in the habit of making a
weekly visit. So, while concluding his purchase of the farm, Monsieur
de Serizy also intended to examine the work of restoration and the
effect of the new furniture. He intended all this to be a surprise to
his wife when he brought her to Presles, and with this idea in his
mind, he had put some personal pride and self-love into the work. How
came it therefore that the count, who intended in the evening to drive
to Presles openly in his own carriage, should be starting early the
next morning incognito in Pierrotin's coucou?

Here a few words on the life of the steward Moreau become
indispensable.

Moreau, steward of the state of Presles, was the son of a provincial
attorney who became during the Revolution syndic-attorney at
Versailles. In that position, Moreau the father had been the means of
almost saving both the lives and property of the Serizys, father and
son. Citizen Moreau belonged to the Danton party; Robespierre,
implacable in his hatreds, pursued him, discovered him, and finally
had him executed at Versailles. Moreau the son, heir to the doctrines
and friendships of his father, was concerned in one of the
conspiracies which assailed the First Consul on his accession to
power. At this crisis, Monsieur de Serizy, anxious to pay his debt of
gratitude, enabled Moreau, lying under sentence of death, to make his
escape; in 1804 he asked for his pardon, obtained it, offered him
first a place in his government office, and finally took him as
private secretary for his own affairs.

Some time after the marriage of his patron Moreau fell in love with
the countess's waiting-woman and married her. To avoid the annoyances
of the false position in which this marriage placed him (more than one
example of which could be seen at the imperial court), Moreau asked
the count to give him the management of the Presles estate, where his
wife could play the lady in a country region, and neither of them
would be made to suffer from wounded self-love. The count wanted a
trustworthy man at Presles, for his wife preferred Serizy, an estate
only fifteen miles from Paris. For three or four years Moreau had held
the key of the count's affairs; he was intelligent, and before the
Revolution he had studied law in his father's office; so Monsieur de
Serizy granted his request.

"You can never advance in life," he said to Moreau, "for you have
broken your neck; but you can be happy, and I will take care that you
are so."

He gave Moreau a salary of three thousand francs and his residence in
a charming lodge near the chateau, all the wood he needed from the
timber that was cut on the estate, oats, hay, and straw for two
horses, and a right to whatever he wanted of the produce of the
gardens. A sub-prefect is not as well provided for.

During the first eight years of his stewardship, Moreau managed the
estate conscientiously; he took an interest in it. The count, coming
down now and then to examine the property, pass judgment on what had
been done, and decide on new purchases, was struck with Moreau's
evident loyalty, and showed his satisfaction by liberal gifts.

But after the birth of Moreau's third child, a daughter, he felt
himself so securely settled in all his comforts at Presles that he
ceased to attribute to Monsieur de Serizy those enormous advantages.
About the year 1816, the steward, who until then had only taken what
he needed for his own use from the estate, accepted a sum of twenty-
five thousand francs from a wood-merchant as an inducement to lease to
the latter, for twelve years, the cutting of all the timber. Moreau
argued this: he could have no pension; he was the father of a family;
the count really owed him that sum as a gift after ten years'
management; already the legitimate possessor of sixty thousand francs
in savings, if he added this sum to that, he could buy a farm worth a
hundred and twenty-five thousand francs in Champagne, a township just
above Isle-Adam, on the right bank of the Oise. Political events
prevented both the count and the neighboring country-people from
becoming aware of this investment, which was made in the name of
Madame Moreau, who was understood to have inherited property from an
aunt of her father.

As soon as the steward had tasted the delightful fruit of the
possession of the property, he began, all the while maintaining toward
the world an appearance of the utmost integrity, to lose no occasion
of increasing his fortune clandestinely; the interests of his three
children served as a poultice to the wounds of his honor.
Nevertheless, we ought in justice to say that while he accepted casks
of wine, and took care of himself in all the purchases that he made
for the count, yet according to the terms of the Code he remained an
honest man, and no proof could have been found to justify an
accusation against him. According to the jurisprudence of the least
thieving cook in Paris, he shared with the count in the profits due to
his own capable management. This manner of swelling his fortune was
simply a case of conscience, that was all. Alert, and thoroughly
understanding the count's interests, Moreau watched for opportunities
to make good purchases all the more eagerly, because he gained a
larger percentage on them. Presles returned a revenue of seventy
thousand francs net. It was a saying of the country-side for a circuit
of thirty miles:--

"Monsieur de Serizy has a second self in Moreau."

Being a prudent man, Moreau invested yearly, after 1817, both his
profits and his salary on the Grand Livre, piling up his heap with the
utmost secrecy. He often refused proposals on the plea of want of
money; and he played the poor man so successfully with the count that
the latter gave him the means to send both his sons to the school
Henri IV. At the present moment Moreau was worth one hundred and
twenty thousand francs of capital invested in the Consolidated thirds,
now paying five per cent, and quoted at eighty francs. These carefully
hidden one hundred and twenty thousand francs, and his farm at
Champagne, enlarged by subsequent purchases, amounted to a fortune of
about two hundred and eighty thousand francs, giving him an income of
some sixteen thousand.

Such was the position of the steward at the time when the Comte de
Serizy desired to purchase the farm of Moulineaux,--the ownership of
which was indispensable to his comfort. This farm consisted of ninety-
six parcels of land bordering the estate of Presles, and frequently
running into it, producing the most annoying discussions as to the
trimming of hedges and ditches and the cutting of trees. Any other
than a cabinet minister would probably have had scores of lawsuits on
his hands. Pere Leger only wished to buy the property in order to sell
to the count at a handsome advance. In order to secure the exorbitant
sum on which his mind was set, the farmer had long endeavored to come
to an understanding with Moreau. Impelled by circumstances, he had,
only three days before this critical Sunday, had a talk with the
steward in the open field, and proved to him clearly that he (Moreau)
could make the count invest his money at two and a half per cent, and
thus appear to serve his patron's interests, while he himself pocketed
forty thousand francs which Leger offered him to bring about the
transaction.

"I tell you what," said the steward to his wife, as he went to bed
that night, "if I make fifty thousand francs out of the Moulineaux
affair,--and I certainly shall, for the count will give me ten
thousand as a fee,--we'll retire to Isle-Adam and live in the Pavillon
de Nogent."

This "pavillon" was a charming place, originally built by the Prince
de Conti for a mistress, and in it every convenience and luxury had
been placed.

"That will suit me," said his wife. "The Dutchman who lives there has
put it in good order, and now that he is obliged to return to India,
he would probably let us have it for thirty thousand francs."

"We shall be close to Champagne," said Moreau. "I am in hopes of
buying the farm and mill of Mours for a hundred thousand francs. That
would give us ten thousand a year in rentals. Nogent is one of the
most delightful residences in the valley; and we should still have an
income of ten thousand from the Grand-Livre."

"But why don't you ask for the post of juge-de-paix at Isle-Adam? That
would give us influence, and fifteen hundred a year salary."

"Well, I did think of it."

With these plans in mind, Moreau, as soon as he heard from the count
that he was coming to Presles, and wished him to invite Margueron to
dinner on Saturday, sent off an express to the count's head-valet,
inclosing a letter to his master, which the messenger failed to
deliver before Monsieur de Serizy retired at his usually early hour.
Augustin, however, placed it, according to custom in such cases, on
his master's desk. In this letter Moreau begged the count not to
trouble himself to come down, but to trust entirely to him. He added
that Margueron was no longer willing to sell the whole in one block,
and talked of cutting the farm up into a number of smaller lots. It
was necessary to circumvent this plan, and perhaps, added Moreau, it
might be best to employ a third party to make the purchase.

Everybody has enemies in this life. Now the steward and his wife had
wounded the feelings of a retired army officer, Monsieur de Reybert,
and his wife, who were living near Presles. From speeches like pin-
pricks, matters had advanced to dagger-thrusts. Monsieur de Reybert
breathed vengeance. He was determined to make Moreau lose his
situation and gain it himself. The two ideas were twins. Thus the
proceedings of the steward, spied upon for two years, were no secret
to Reybert. The same conveyance that took Moreau's letter to the count
conveyed Madame de Reybert, whom her husband despatched to Paris.
There she asked with such earnestness to see the count that although
she was sent away at nine o'clock, he having then gone to bed, she was
ushered into his study the next morning at seven.

"Monsieur," she said to the cabinet-minister, "we are incapable, my
husband and I, of writing anonymous letters, therefore I have come to
see you in person. I am Madame de Reybert, nee de Corroy. My husband
is a retired officer, with a pension of six hundred francs, and we
live at Presles, where your steward has offered us insult after
insult, although we are persons of good station. Monsieur de Reybert,
who is not an intriguing man, far from it, is a captain of artillery,
retired in 1816, having served twenty years,--always at a distance
from the Emperor, Monsieur le comte. You know of course how difficult
it is for soldiers who are not under the eye of their master to obtain
promotion,--not counting that the integrity and frankness of Monsieur
de Reybert were displeasing to his superiors. My husband has watched
your steward for the last three years, being aware of his dishonesty
and intending to have him lose his place. We are, as you see, quite
frank with you. Moreau has made us his enemies, and we have watched
him. I have come to tell you that you are being tricked in the
purchase of the Moulineaux farm. They mean to get an extra hundred
thousand francs out of you, which are to be divided between the
notary, the farmer Leger, and Moreau. You have written Moreau to
invite Margueron, and you are going to Presles to-day; but Margueron
will be ill, and Leger is so certain of buying the farm that he is now
in Paris to draw the money. If we have enlightened you as to what is
going on, and if you want an upright steward you will take my husband;
though noble, he will serve you as he has served the State. Your
steward has made a fortune of two hundred and fifty thousand francs
out of his place; he is not to be pitied therefore."

The count thanked Madame de Reybert coldly, bestowing upon her the
holy-water of courts, for he despised backbiting; but for all that, he
remembered Derville's doubts, and felt inwardly shaken. Just then he
saw his steward's letter and read it. In its assurances of devotion
and its respectful reproaches for the distrust implied in wishing to
negotiate the purchase for himself, he read the truth.

"Corruption has come to him with fortune,--as it always does!" he said
to himself.

The count then made several inquiries of Madame de Reybert, less to
obtain information than to gain time to observe her; and he wrote a
short note to his notary telling him not to send his head-clerk to
Presles as requested, but to come there himself in time for dinner.

"Though Monsieur le comte," said Madame de Reybert in conclusion, "may
have judged me unfavorably for the step I have taken unknown to my
husband, he ought to be convinced that we have obtained this
information about his steward in a natural and honorable manner; the
most sensitive conscience cannot take exception to it."

So saying, Madame de Reybert, nee de Corroy, stood erect as a pike-
staff. She presented to the rapid investigation of the count a face
seamed with the small-pox like a colander with holes, a flat, spare
figure, two light and eager eyes, fair hair plastered down upon an
anxious forehead, a small drawn-bonnet of faded green taffetas lined
with pink, a white gown with violet spots, and leather shoes. The
count recognized the wife of some poor, half-pay captain, a puritan,
subscribing no doubt to the "Courrier Francais," earnest in virtue,
but aware of the comfort of a good situation and eagerly coveting it.

"You say your husband has a pension of six hundred francs," he said,
replying to his own thoughts, and not to the remark Madame de Reybert
had just made.

"Yes, monsieur."

"You were born a Corroy?"

"Yes, monsieur,--a noble family of Metz, where my husband belongs."

"In what regiment did Monsieur de Reybert serve?"

"The 7th artillery."

"Good!" said the count, writing down the number.

He had thought at one time of giving the management of the estate to
some retired army officer, about whom he could obtain exact
information from the minister of war.

"Madame," he resumed, ringing for his valet, "return to Presles, this
afternoon with my notary, who is going down there for dinner, and to
whom I have recommended you. Here is his address. I am going myself
secretly to Presles, and will send for Monsieur de Reybert to come and
speak to me."

It will thus be seen that Monsieur de Serizy's journey by a public
conveyance, and the injunction conveyed by the valet to conceal his
name and rank had not unnecessarily alarmed Pierrotin. That worthy had
just forebodings of a danger which was about to swoop down upon one of
his best customers.

CHAPTER III

THE TRAVELLERS

As Pierrotin issued from the Cafe de l'Echiquier, after treating the
valet, he saw in the gate-way of the Lion d'Argent the lady and the
young man in whom his perspicacity at once detected customers, for the
lady with outstretched neck and anxious face was evidently looking for
him. She was dressed in a black-silk gown that was dyed, a brown
bonnet, an old French cashmere shawl, raw-silk stockings, and low
shoes; and in her hand she carried a straw bag and a blue umbrella.
This woman, who had once been beautiful, seemed to be about forty
years of age; but her blue eyes, deprived of the fire which happiness
puts there, told plainly that she had long renounced the world. Her
dress, as well as her whole air and demeanor, indicated a mother
wholly devoted to her household and her son. If the strings of her
bonnet were faded, the shape betrayed that it was several years old.
The shawl was fastened by a broken needle converted into a pin by a
bead of sealing-wax. She was waiting impatiently for Pierrotin,
wishing to recommend to his special care her son, who was doubtless
travelling for the first time, and with whom she had come to the
coach-office as much from doubt of his ability as from maternal
affection.

This mother was in every way completed by the son, so that the son
would not be understood without the mother. If the mother condemned
herself to mended gloves, the son wore an olive-green coat with
sleeves too short for him, proving that he had grown, and might grow
still more, like other adults of eighteen or nineteen years of age.
The blue trousers, mended by his mother, presented to the eye a
brighter patch of color when the coat-tails maliciously parted behind
him.

"Don't rub your gloves that way, you'll spoil them," she was saying as
Pierrotin appeared. "Is this the conductor? Ah! Pierrotin, is it you?"
she exclaimed, leaving her son and taking the coachman apart a few
steps.

"I hope you're well, Madame Clapart," he replied, with an air that
expressed both respect and familiarity.

"Yes, Pierrotin, very well. Please take good care of my Oscar; he is
travelling alone for the first time."

"Oh! so he is going alone to Monsieur Moreau!" cried Pierrotin, for
the purpose of finding out whether he were really going there.

"Yes," said the mother.

"Then Madame Moreau is willing?" returned Pierrotin, with a sly look.

"Ah!" said the mother, "it will not be all roses for him, poor child!
But his future absolutely requires that I should send him."

This answer struck Pierrotin, who hesitated to confide his fears for
the steward to Madame Clapart, while she, on her part, was afraid of
injuring her boy if she asked Pierrotin for a care which might have
transformed him into a mentor. During this short deliberation, which
was ostensibly covered by a few phrases as to the weather, the
journey, and the stopping-places along the road, we will ourselves
explain what were the ties that united Madame Clapart with Pierrotin,
and authorized the two confidential remarks which they have just
exchanged.

Often--that is to say, three or four times a month--Pierrotin, on his
way to Paris, would find the steward on the road near La Cave. As soon
as the vehicle came up, Moreau would sign to a gardener, who, with
Pierrotin's help, would put upon the coach either one or two baskets
containing the fruits and vegetables of the season, chickens, eggs,
butter, and game. The steward always paid the carriage and Pierrotin's
fee, adding the money necessary to pay the toll at the barriere, if
the baskets contained anything dutiable. These baskets, hampers, or
packages, were never directed to any one. On the first occasion, which
served for all others, the steward had given Madame Clapart's address
by word of mouth to the discreet Pierrotin, requesting him never to
deliver to others the precious packages. Pierrotin, impressed with the
idea of an intrigue between the steward and some pretty girl, had gone
as directed to number 7 rue de la Cerisaie, in the Arsenal quarter,
and had there found the Madame Clapart just portrayed, instead of the
young and beautiful creature he expected to find.

The drivers of public conveyances and carriers are called by their
business to enter many homes, and to be cognizant of many secrets; but
social accident, that sub-providence, having willed that they be
without education and devoid of the talent of observation, it follows
that they are not dangerous. Nevertheless, at the end of a few months,
Pierrotin was puzzled to explain the exact relations of Monsieur
Moreau and Madame Clapart from what he saw of the household in the rue
de la Cerisaie. Though lodgings were not dear at that time in the
Arsenal quarter, Madame Clapart lived on a third floor at the end of a
court-yard, in a house which was formerly that of a great family, in
the days when the higher nobility of the kingdom lived on the ancient
site of the Palais des Tournelles and the hotel Saint-Paul. Toward the
end of the sixteenth century, the great seigneurs divided among
themselves these vast spaces, once occupied by the gardens of the
kings of France, as indicated by the present names of the streets,--
Cerisaie, Beautreillis, des Lions, etc. Madame Clapart's apartment,
which was panelled throughout with ancient carvings, consisted of
three connecting rooms, a dining-room, salon, and bedroom. Above it
was the kitchen, and a bedroom for Oscar. Opposite to the entrance, on
what is called in Paris "le carre,"--that is, the square landing,--was
the door of a back room, opening, on every floor, into a sort of tower
built of rough stone, in which was also the well for the staircase.
This was the room in which Moreau slept whenever he went to Paris.

Pierrotin had seen in the first room, where he deposited the hampers,
six wooden chairs with straw seats, a table, and a sideboard; at the
windows, discolored curtains. Later, when he entered the salon, he
noticed some old Empire furniture, now shabby; but only as much as all
proprietors exact to secure their rent. Pierrotin judged of the
bedroom by the salon and dining-room. The wood-work, painted coarsely
of a reddish white, which thickened and blurred the mouldings and
figurines, far from being ornamental, was distressing to the eye. The
floors, never waxed, were of that gray tone we see in boarding-
schools. When Pierrotin came upon Monsieur and Madame Clapart at their
meals he saw that their china, glass, and all other little articles
betrayed the utmost poverty; and yet, though the chipped and mended
dishes and tureens were those of the poorest families and provoked
pity, the forks and spoons were of silver.

Monsieur Clapart, clothed in a shabby surtout, his feet in broken
slippers, always wore green spectacles, and exhibited, whenever he
removed his shabby cap of a bygone period, a pointed skull, from the
top of which trailed a few dirty filaments which even a poet could
scarcely call hair. This man, of wan complexion, seemed timorous, but
withal tyrannical.

In this dreary apartment, which faced the north and had no other
outlook than to a vine on the opposite wall and a well in the corner
of the yard, Madame Clapart bore herself with the airs of a queen, and
moved like a woman unaccustomed to go anywhere on foot. Often, while
thanking Pierrotin, she gave him glances which would have touched to
pity an intelligent observer; from time to time she would slip a
twelve-sous piece into his hand, and then her voice was charming.
Pierrotin had never seen Oscar, for the reason that the boy was always
in school at the time his business took him to the house.

Here is the sad story which Pierrotin could never have discovered,
even by asking for information, as he sometimes did, from the portress
of the house; for that individual knew nothing beyond the fact that
the Claparts paid a rent of two hundred and fifty francs a year, had
no servant but a charwoman who came daily for a few hours in the
morning, that Madame Clapart did some of her smaller washing herself,
and paid the postage on her letters daily, being apparently unable to
let the sum accumulate.

There does not exist, or rather, there seldom exists, a criminal who
is wholly criminal. Neither do we ever meet with a dishonest nature
which is completely dishonest. It is possible for a man to cheat his
master to his own advantage, or rake in for himself alone all the hay
in the manger, but, even while laying up capital by actions more or
less illicit, there are few men who never do good ones. If only from
self-love, curiosity, or by way of variety, or by chance, every man
has his moment of beneficence; he may call it his error, he may never
do it again, but he sacrifices to Goodness, as the most surly man
sacrifices to the Graces once or twice in his life. If Moreau's faults
can ever be excused, it might be on the score of his persistent
kindness in succoring a woman of whose favors he had once been proud,
and in whose house he was hidden when in peril of his life.

This woman, celebrated under the Directory for her liaison with one of
the five kings of that reign, married, through that all-powerful
protection, a purveyor who was making his millions out of the
government, and whom Napoleon ruined in 1802. This man, named Husson,
became insane through his sudden fall from opulence to poverty; he
flung himself into the Seine, leaving the beautiful Madame Husson
pregnant. Moreau, very intimately allied with Madame Husson, was at
that time condemned to death; he was unable therefore to marry the
widow, being forced to leave France. Madame Husson, then twenty-two
years old, married in her deep distress a government clerk named
Clapart, aged twenty-seven, who was said to be a rising man. At that
period of our history, government clerks were apt to become persons of
importance; for Napoleon was ever on the lookout for capacity. But
Clapart, though endowed by nature with a certain coarse beauty, proved
to have no intelligence. Thinking Madame Husson very rich, he feigned
a great passion for her, and was simply saddled with the impossibility
of satisfying either then or in the future the wants she had acquired
in a life of opulence. He filled, very poorly, a place in the Treasury
that gave him a salary of eighteen hundred francs; which was all the
new household had to live on. When Moreau returned to France as the
secretary of the Comte de Serizy he heard of Madame Husson's pitiable
condition, and he was able, before his own marriage, to get her an
appointment as head-waiting-woman to Madame Mere, the Emperor's
mother. But in spite of that powerful protection Clapart was never
promoted; his incapacity was too apparent.

Ruined in 1815 by the fall of the Empire, the brilliant Aspasia of the
Directory had no other resources than Clapart's salary of twelve
hundred francs from a clerkship obtained for him through the Comte de
Serizy. Moreau, the only protector of a woman whom he had known in
possession of millions, obtained a half-scholarship for her son, Oscar
Husson, at the school of Henri IV.; and he sent her regularly, by
Pierrotin, such supplies from the estate at Presles as he could
decently offer to a household in distress.

Oscar was the whole life and all the future of his mother. The poor
woman could now be reproached with no other fault than her exaggerated
tenderness for her boy,--the bete-noire of his step-father. Oscar was,
unfortunately, endowed by nature with a foolishness his mother did not
perceive, in spite of the step-father's sarcasms. This foolishness--
or, to speak more specifically, this overweening conceit--so troubled
Monsieur Moreau that he begged Madame Clapart to send the boy down to
him for a month that he might study his character, and find out what
career he was fit for. Moreau was really thinking of some day
proposing Oscar to the count as his successor.

But to give to the devil and to God what respectively belongs to them,
perhaps it would be well to show the causes of Oscar Husson's silly
self-conceit, premising that he was born in the household of Madame
Mere. During his early childhood his eyes were dazzled by imperial
splendors. His pliant imagination retained the impression of those
gorgeous scenes, and nursed the images of a golden time of pleasure in
hopes of recovering them. The natural boastfulness of school-boys
(possessed of a desire to outshine their mates) resting on these
memories of his childhood was developed in him beyond all measure. It
may also have been that his mother at home dwelt too fondly on the
days when she herself was a queen in Directorial Paris. At any rate,
Oscar, who was now leaving school, had been made to bear many
humiliations which the paying pupils put upon those who hold
scholarships, unless the scholars are able to impose respect by
superior physical ability.

This mixture of former splendor now departed, of beauty gone, of blind
maternal love, of sufferings heroically borne, made the mother one of
those pathetic figures which catch the eye of many an observer in
Paris.

Incapable, naturally, of understanding the real attachment of Moreau
to this woman, or that of the woman for the man she had saved in 1797,
now her only friend, Pierrotin did not think it best to communicate
the suspicion that had entered his head as to some danger which was
threatening Moreau. The valet's speech, "We have enough to do in this
world to look after ourselves," returned to his mind, and with it came
that sentiment of obedience to what he called the "chefs de file,"--
the front-rank men in war, and men of rank in peace. Besides, just now
Pierrotin's head was as full of his own stings as there are five-franc
pieces in a thousand francs. So that the "Very good, madame,"
"Certainly, madame," with which he replied to the poor mother, to whom
a trip of twenty miles appeared a journey, showed plainly that he
desired to get away from her useless and prolix instructions.

"You will be sure to place the packages so that they cannot get wet if
the weather should happen to change."

"I've a hood," replied Pierrotin. "Besides, see, madame, with what
care they are being placed."

"Oscar, don't stay more than two weeks, no matter how much they may
ask you," continued Madame Clapart, returning to her son. "You can't
please Madame Moreau, whatever you do; besides, you must be home by
the end of September. We are to go to Belleville, you know, to your
uncle Cardot."

"Yes, mamma."

"Above all," she said, in a low voice, "be sure never to speak about
servants; keep thinking all the time that Madame Moreau was once a
waiting-maid."

"Yes, mamma."

Oscar, like all youths whose vanity is excessively ticklish, seemed
annoyed at being lectured on the threshold of the Lion d'Argent.

"Well, now good-bye, mamma. We shall start soon; there's the horse all
harnessed."

The mother, forgetting that she was in the open street, embraced her
Oscar, and said, smiling, as she took a little roll from her basket:--

"Tiens! you were forgetting your roll and the chocolate! My child,
once more, I repeat, don't take anything at the inns; they'd make you
pay for the slightest thing ten times what it is worth."

Oscar would fain have seen his mother farther off as she stuffed the
bread and chocolate into his pocket. The scene had two witnesses,--two
young men a few years older than Oscar, better dressed than he,
without a mother hanging on to them, whose actions, dress, and ways
all betokened that complete independence which is the one desire of a
lad still tied to his mother's apron-strings.

"He said MAMMA!" cried one of the new-comers, laughing.

The words reached Oscar's ears and drove him to say, "Good-bye,
mother!" in a tone of terrible impatience.

Let us admit that Madame Clapart spoke too loudly, and seemed to wish
to show to those around them her tenderness for the boy.

"What is the matter with you, Oscar?" asked the poor hurt woman. "I
don't know what to make of you," she added in a severe tone, fancying
herself able to inspire him with respect,--a great mistake made by
those who spoil their children. "Listen, my Oscar," she said, resuming
at once her tender voice, "you have a propensity to talk, and to tell
all you know, and all that you don't know; and you do it to show off,
with the foolish vanity of a mere lad. Now, I repeat, endeavor to keep
your tongue in check. You are not sufficiently advanced in life, my
treasure, to be able to judge of the persons with whom you may be
thrown; and there is nothing more dangerous than to talk in public
conveyances. Besides, in a diligence well-bred persons always keep
silence."

The two young men, who seemed to have walked to the farther end of the
establishment, here returned, making their boot-heels tap upon the
paved passage of the porte-cochere. They might have heard the whole of
this maternal homily. So, in order to rid himself of his mother, Oscar
had recourse to an heroic measure, which proved how vanity stimulates
the intellect.

"Mamma," he said, "you are standing in a draught, and you may take
cold. Besides, I am going to get into the coach."

The lad must have touched some tender spot, for his mother caught him
to her bosom, kissed him as if he were starting upon a long journey,
and went with him to the vehicle with tears in her eyes.

"Don't forget to give five francs to the servants when you come away,"
she said; "write me three times at least during the fifteen days;
behave properly, and remember all that I have told you. You have linen
enough; don't send any to the wash. And above all, remember Monsieur
Moreau's kindness; mind him as you would a father, and follow his
advice."

As he got into the coach, Oscar's blue woollen stockings became
visible, through the action of his trousers which drew up suddenly,
also the new patch in the said trousers was seen, through the parting
of his coat-tails. The smiles of the two young men, on whom these
signs of an honorable indigence were not lost, were so many fresh
wounds to the lad's vanity.

"The first place was engaged for Oscar," said the mother to Pierrotin.
"Take the back seat," she said to the boy, looking fondly at him with
a loving smile.

Oh! how Oscar regretted that trouble and sorrow had destroyed his
mother's beauty, and that poverty and self-sacrifice prevented her
from being better dressed! One of the young men, the one who wore top-
boots and spurs, nudged the other to make him take notice of Oscar's
mother, and the other twirled his moustache with a gesture which
signified,--

"Rather pretty figure!"

"How shall I ever get rid of mamma?" thought Oscar.

"What's the matter?" asked Madame Clapart.

Oscar pretended not to hear, the monster! Perhaps Madame Clapart was
lacking in tact under the circumstances; but all absorbing sentiments
have so much egotism!

"Georges, do you like children when travelling?" asked one young man
of the other.

"Yes, my good Amaury, if they are weaned, and are named Oscar, and
have chocolate."

These speeches were uttered in half-tones to allow Oscar to hear them
or not hear them as he chose; his countenance was to be the weather-
gauge by which the other young traveller could judge how much fun he
might be able to get out of the lad during the journey. Oscar chose
not to hear. He looked to see if his mother, who weighed upon him like
a nightmare, was still there, for he felt that she loved him too well
to leave him so quickly. Not only did he involuntarily compare the
dress of his travelling companion with his own, but he felt that his
mother's toilet counted for much in the smiles of the two young men.

"If they would only take themselves off!" he said to himself.

Instead of that, Amaury remarked to Georges, giving a tap with his
cane to the heavy wheel of the coucou:

"And so, my friend, you are really going to trust your future to this
fragile bark?"

"I must," replied Georges, in a tone of fatalism.

Oscar gave a sigh as he remarked the jaunty manner in which his
companion's hat was stuck on one ear for the purpose of showing a
magnificent head of blond hair beautifully brushed and curled; while
he, by order of his step-father, had his black hair cut like a
clothes-brush across the forehead, and clipped, like a soldier's,
close to the head. The face of the vain lad was round and chubby and
bright with the hues of health, while that of his fellow-traveller was
long, and delicate, and pale. The forehead of the latter was broad,
and his chest filled out a waistcoat of cashmere pattern. As Oscar
admired the tight-fitting iron-gray trousers and the overcoat with its
frogs and olives clasping the waist, it seemed to him that this
romantic-looking stranger, gifted with such advantages, insulted him
by his superiority, just as an ugly woman feels injured by the mere
sight of a pretty one. The click of the stranger's boot-heels offended
his taste and echoed in his heart. He felt as hampered by his own
clothes (made no doubt at home out of those of his step-father) as
that envied young man seemed at ease in his.

"That fellow must have heaps of francs in his trousers pocket,"
thought Oscar.

The young man turned round. What were Oscar's feelings on beholding a
gold chain round his neck, at the end of which no doubt was a gold
watch! From that moment the young man assumed, in Oscar's eyes, the
proportions of a personage.

Living in the rue de la Cerisaie since 1815, taken to and from school
by his step-father, Oscar had no other points of comparison since his
adolescence than the poverty-stricken household of his mother. Brought
up strictly, by Moreau's advice, he seldom went to the theatre, and
then to nothing better than the Ambigu-Comique, where his eyes could
see little elegance, if indeed the eyes of a child riveted on a
melodrama were likely to examine the audience. His step-father still
wore, after the fashion of the Empire, his watch in the fob of his
trousers, from which there depended over his abdomen a heavy gold
chain, ending in a bunch of heterogeneous ornaments, seals, and a
watch-key with a round top and flat sides, on which was a landscape in
mosaic. Oscar, who considered that old-fashioned finery as the "ne
plus ultra" of adornment, was bewildered by the present revelation of
superior and negligent elegance. The young man exhibited, offensively,
a pair of spotless gloves, and seemed to wish to dazzle Oscar by
twirling with much grace a gold-headed switch cane.

Oscar had reached that last quarter of adolescence when little things
cause immense joys and immense miseries,--a period when youth prefers
misfortune to a ridiculous suit of clothes, and caring nothing for the
real interests of life, torments itself about frivolities, about
neckcloths, and the passionate desire to appear a man. Then the young
fellow swells himself out; his swagger is all the more portentous
because it is exercised on nothings. Yet if he envies a fool who is
elegantly dressed, he is also capable of enthusiasm over talent, and
of genuine admiration for genius. Such defects as these, when they
have no root in the heart, prove only the exuberance of sap,--the
richness of the youthful imagination. That a lad of nineteen, an only
child, kept severely at home by poverty, adored by a mother who put
upon herself all privations for his sake, should be moved to envy by a
young man of twenty-two in a frogged surtout-coat silk-lined, a waist-
coat of fancy cashmere, and a cravat slipped through a ring of the
worse taste, is nothing more than a peccadillo committed in all ranks
of social life by inferiors who envy those that seem beyond them. Men
of genius themselves succumb to this primitive passion. Did not
Rousseau admire Ventura and Bacle?

But Oscar passed from peccadillo to evil feelings. He felt humiliated;
he was angry with the youth he envied, and there rose in his heart a
secret desire to show openly that he himself was as good as the object
of his envy.

The two young fellows continued to walk up and own from the gate to
the stables, and from the stables to the gate. Each time they turned
they looked at Oscar curled up in his corner of the coucou. Oscar,
persuaded that their jokes and laughter concerned himself, affected
the utmost indifference. He began to hum the chorus of a song lately
brought into vogue by the liberals, which ended with the words, "'Tis
Voltaire's fault, 'tis Rousseau's fault."

"Tiens! perhaps he is one of the chorus at the Opera," said Amaury.

This exasperated Oscar, who bounded up, pulled out the wooden "back,"
and called to Pierrotin:--

"When do we start?"

"Presently," said that functionary, who was standing, whip in hand,
and gazing toward the rue d'Enghien.

At this moment the scene was enlivened by the arrival of a young man
accompanied by a true "gamin," who was followed by a porter dragging a
hand-cart. The young man came up to Pierrotin and spoke to him
confidentially, on which the latter nodded his head, and called to his
own porter. The man ran out and helped to unload the little hand-cart,
which contained, besides two trunks, buckets, brushes, boxes of
singular shape, and an infinity of packages and utensils which the
youngest of the new-comers, who had climbed into the imperial, stowed
away with such celerity that Oscar, who happened to be smiling at his
mother, now standing on the other side of the street, saw none of the
paraphernalia which might have revealed to him the profession of his
new travelling companion.

The gamin, who must have been sixteen years of age, wore a gray blouse
buckled round his waist by a polished leather belt. His cap, jauntily
perched on the side of his head, seemed the sign of a merry nature,
and so did the picturesque disorder of the curly brown hair which fell
upon his shoulders. A black-silk cravat drew a line round his very
white neck, and added to the vivacity of his bright gray eyes. The
animation of his brown and rosy face, the moulding of his rather large
lips, the ears detached from his head, his slightly turned-up nose,--
in fact, all the details of his face proclaimed the lively spirit of a
Figaro, and the careless gayety of youth, while the vivacity of his
gesture and his mocking eye revealed an intellect already developed by
the practice of a profession adopted very early in life. As he had
already some claims to personal value, this child, made man by Art or
by vocation, seemed indifferent to the question of costume; for he
looked at his boots, which had not been polished, with a quizzical
air, and searched for the spots on his brown Holland trousers less to
remove them than to see their effect.

"I'm in style," he said, giving himself a shake and addressing his
companion.

The glance of the latter, showed authority over his adept, in whom a
practised eye would at once have recognized the joyous pupil of a
painter, called in the argot of the studios a "rapin."

"Behave yourself, Mistigris," said his master, giving him the nickname
which the studio had no doubt bestowed upon him.

The master was a slight and pale young man, with extremely thick black
hair, worn in a disorder that was actually fantastic. But this
abundant mass of hair seemed necessary to an enormous head, whose vast
forehead proclaimed a precocious intellect. A strained and harassed
face, too original to be ugly, was hollowed as if this noticeable
young man suffered from some chronic malady, or from privations caused
by poverty (the most terrible of all chronic maladies), or from griefs
too recent to be forgotten. His clothing, analogous, with due
allowance, to that of Mistigris, consisted of a shabby surtout coat,
American-green in color, much worn, but clean and well-brushed; a
black waistcoat buttoned to the throat, which almost concealed a
scarlet neckerchief; and trousers, also black and even more worn than
the coat, flapping his thin legs. In addition, a pair of very muddy
boots indicated that he had come on foot and from some distance to the
coach office. With a rapid look this artist seized the whole scene of
the Lion d'Argent, the stables, the courtyard, the various lights and
shades, and the details; then he looked at Mistigris, whose satirical
glance had followed his own.

"Charming!" said Mistigris.

"Yes, very," replied the other.

"We seem to have got here too early," pursued Mistigris. "Couldn't we
get a mouthful somewhere? My stomach, like Nature, abhors a vacuum."

"Have we time to get a cup of coffee?" said the artist, in a gentle
voice, to Pierrotin.

"Yes, but don't be long," answered the latter.

"Good; that means we have a quarter of an hour," remarked Mistigris,
with the innate genius for observation of the Paris rapin.

The pair disappeared. Nine o'clock was striking in the hotel kitchen.
Georges thought it just and reasonable to remonstrate with Pierrotin.

"Hey! my friend; when a man is blessed with such wheels as these
(striking the clumsy tires with his cane) he ought at least to have
the merit of punctuality. The deuce! one doesn't get into that thing
for pleasure; I have business that is devilishly pressing or I
wouldn't trust my bones to it. And that horse, which you call Rougeot,
he doesn't look likely to make up for lost time."

"We are going to harness Bichette while those gentlemen take their
coffee," replied Pierrotin. "Go and ask, you," he said to his porter,
"if Pere Leger is coming with us--"

"Where is your Pere Leger?" asked Georges.

"Over the way, at number 50. He couldn't get a place in the Beaumont
diligence," said Pierrotin, still speaking to his porter and
apparently making no answer to his customer; then he disappeared
himself in search of Bichette.

Georges, after shaking hands with his friend, got into the coach,
handling with an air of great importance a portfolio which he placed
beneath the cushion of the seat. He took the opposite corner to that
of Oscar, on the same seat.

"This Pere Leger troubles me," he said.

"They can't take away our places," replied Oscar. "I have number one."

"And I number two," said Georges.

Just as Pierrotin reappeared, having harnessed Bichette, the porter
returned with a stout man in tow, whose weight could not have been
less than two hundred and fifty pounds at the very least. Pere Leger
belonged to the species of farmer which has a square back, a
protuberant stomach, a powdered pigtail, and wears a little coat of
blue linen. His white gaiters, coming above the knee, were fastened
round the ends of his velveteen breeches and secured by silver
buckles. His hob-nailed shoes weighed two pounds each. In his hand, he
held a small reddish stick, much polished, with a large knob, which
was fastened round his wrist by a thong of leather.

"And you are called Pere Leger?" asked Georges, very seriously, as the
farmer attempted to put a foot on the step.

"At your service," replied the farmer, looking in and showing a face
like that of Louis XVIII., with fat, rubicund cheeks, from between
which issued a nose that in any other face would have seemed enormous.
His smiling eyes were sunken in rolls of fat. "Come, a helping hand,
my lad!" he said to Pierrotin.

The farmer was hoisted in by the united efforts of Pierrotin and the
porter, to cries of "Houp la! hi! ha! hoist!" uttered by Georges.

"Oh! I'm not going far; only to La Cave," said the farmer, good-
humoredly.

In France everybody takes a joke.

"Take the back seat," said Pierrotin, "there'll be six of you."

"Where's your other horse?" demanded Georges. "Is it as mythical as
the third post-horse."

"There she is," said Pierrotin, pointing to the little mare, who was
coming along alone.

"He calls that insect a horse!" exclaimed Georges.

"Oh! she's good, that little mare," said the farmer, who by this time
was seated. "Your servant, gentlemen. Well, Pierrotin, how soon do you
start?"

"I have two travellers in there after a cup of coffee," replied
Pierrotin.

The hollow-cheeked young man and his page reappeared.

"Come, let's start!" was the general cry.

"We are going to start," replied Pierrotin. "Now, then, make ready,"
he said to the porter, who began thereupon to take away the stones
which stopped the wheels.

Pierrotin took Rougeot by the bridle and gave that guttural cry, "Ket,
ket!" to tell the two animals to collect their energy; on which,
though evidently stiff, they pulled the coach to the door of the Lion
d'Argent. After which manoeuvre, which was purely preparatory,
Pierrotin gazed up the rue d'Enghien and then disappeared, leaving the
coach in charge of the porter.

"Ah ca! is he subject to such attacks,--that master of yours?" said
Mistigris, addressing the porter.

"He has gone to fetch his feed from the stable," replied the porter,
well versed in all the usual tricks to keep passengers quiet.

"Well, after all," said Mistigris, "'art is long, but life is short'
--to Bichette."

At this particular epoch, a fancy for mutilating or transposing
proverbs reigned in the studios. It was thought a triumph to find
changes of letters, and sometimes of words, which still kept the
semblance of the proverb while giving it a fantastic or ridiculous
meaning.[*]

[*] It is plainly impossible to translate many of these proverbs and
put any fun or meaning into them.--Tr.

"Patience, Mistigris!" said his master; "'come wheel, come whoa.'"

Pierrotin here returned, bringing with him the Comte de Serizy, who
had come through the rue de l'Echiquier, and with whom he had
doubtless had a short conversation.

"Pere Leger," said Pierrotin, looking into the coach, "will you give
your place to Monsieur le comte? That will balance the carriage
better."

"We sha'n't be off for an hour if you go on this way," cried Georges.
"We shall have to take down this infernal bar, which cost such trouble
to put up. Why should everybody be made to move for the man who comes
last? We all have a right to the places we took. What place has
monsieur engaged? Come, find that out! Haven't you a way-book, a
register, or something? What place has Monsieur Lecomte engaged?--
count of what, I'd like to know."

"Monsieur le comte," said Pierrotin, visibly troubled, "I am afraid
you will be uncomfortable."

"Why didn't you keep better count of us?" said Mistigris. "'Short
counts make good ends.'"

"Mistigris, behave yourself," said his master.

Monsieur de Serizy was evidently taken by all the persons in the coach
for a bourgeois of the name of Lecomte.

"Don't disturb any one," he said to Pierrotin. "I will sit with you in
front."

"Come, Mistigris," said the master to his rapin, "remember the respect
you owe to age; you don't know how shockingly old you may be yourself
some day. 'Travel deforms youth.' Give your place to monsieur."

Mistigris opened the leathern curtain and jumped out with the agility
of a frog leaping into the water.

"You mustn't be a rabbit, august old man," he said to the count.

"Mistigris, 'ars est celare bonum,'" said his master.

"I thank you very much, monsieur," said the count to Mistigris's
master, next to whom he now sat.

The minister of State cast a sagacious glance round the interior of
the coach, which greatly affronted both Oscar and Georges.

"When persons want to be master of a coach, they should engage all the
places," remarked Georges.

Certain now of his incognito, the Comte de Serizy made no reply to
this observation, but assumed the air of a good-natured bourgeois.

"Suppose you were late, wouldn't you be glad that the coach waited for
you?" said the farmer to the two young men.

Pierrotin still looked up and down the street, whip in hand,
apparently reluctant to mount to the hard seat where Mistigris was
fidgeting.

"If you expect some one else, I am not the last," said the count.

"I agree to that reasoning," said Mistigris.

Georges and Oscar began to laugh impertinently.

"The old fellow doesn't know much," whispered Georges to Oscar, who
was delighted at this apparent union between himself and the object of
his envy.

"Parbleu!" cried Pierrotin, "I shouldn't be sorry for two more
passengers."

"I haven't paid; I'll get out," said Georges, alarmed.

"What are you waiting for, Pierrotin?" asked Pere Leger.

Whereupon Pierrotin shouted a certain "Hi!" in which Bichette and
Rougeot recognized a definitive resolution, and they both sprang
toward the rise of the faubourg at a pace which was soon to slacken.

The count had a red face, of a burning red all over, on which were
certain inflamed portions which his snow-white hair brought out into
full relief. To any but heedless youths, this complexion would have
revealed a constant inflammation of the blood, produced by incessant
labor. These blotches and pimples so injured the naturally noble air
of the count that careful examination was needed to find in his green-
gray eyes the shrewdness of the magistrate, the wisdom of a statesman,
and the knowledge of a legislator. His face was flat, and the nose
seemed to have been depressed into it. The hat hid the grace and
beauty of his forehead. In short, there was enough to amuse those
thoughtless youths in the odd contrasts of the silvery hair, the
burning face, and the thick, tufted eye-brows which were still jet-
black.

The count wore a long blue overcoat, buttoned in military fashion to
the throat, a white cravat around his neck, cotton wool in his ears,
and a shirt-collar high enough to make a large square patch of white
on each cheek. His black trousers covered his boots, the toes of
which were barely seen. He wore no decoration in his button-hole, and
doeskin gloves concealed his hands. Nothing about him betrayed to the
eyes of youth a peer of France, and one of the most useful statesmen
in the kingdom.

Pere Leger had never seen the count, who, on his side, knew the former
only by name. When the count, as he got into the carriage, cast the
glance about him which affronted Georges and Oscar, he was, in
reality, looking for the head-clerk of his notary (in case he had been
forced, like himself, to take Pierrotin's vehicle), intending to
caution him instantly about his own incognito. But feeling reassured
by the appearance of Oscar, and that of Pere Leger, and, above all, by
the quasi-military air, the waxed moustaches, and the general look of
an adventurer that distinguished Georges, he concluded that his note
had reached his notary, Alexandre Crottat, in time to prevent the
departure of the clerk.

"Pere Leger," said Pierrotin, when they reached the steep hill of the
faubourg Saint-Denis by the rue de la Fidelite, "suppose we get out,
hey?"

"I'll get out, too," said the count, hearing Leger's name.

"Goodness! if this is how we are going, we shall do fourteen miles in
fifteen days!" cried Georges.

"It isn't my fault," said Pierrotin, "if a passenger wishes to get
out."

"Ten louis for you if you keep t